You know that guilt we carry around while going through infertility treatments? The part where we second guess each choice and worry that we’ve messed something up? I wrote about one of my guilt stricken moments a while back during who knows which round of IVF. That guilt doesn’t simply go away with a big fat positive (BFP), I think it just morphs into something new. Maybe even something similar to survivor guilt.

Let’s talk about that.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard a woman who is pregnant after IVF express guilt over complaining about anything pregnancy related. Just the other day I was reading a post from a woman who was struggling with guilt because she felt bad over the fact that she wanted to complain about throwing up multiple times per day, everyday. Let me repeat that. This poor woman is vomiting her guts out repeatedly every freaking day, and she felt like she was being ungrateful if she let on that she wasn’t loving “puke fest 2018”. Wait, what?!

So I’m just going to say it. Just because we are pregnant after struggling long and hard with infertility, doesn’t mean that we should love pregnancy symptoms. And just because we don’t like nausea, vomiting, exhaustion, etc., does NOT mean that we are ungrateful to be pregnant. We are grateful. And we are so very sad and empathetic toward all the women continuing to fight the infertility battle.

But still, pregnancy symptoms are just as hard for us as they are for our fertile sisters. And they get to complain without the added guilt. In fact, they get sympathy for their symptoms. And so should we. Throwing up is not fun for anyone, regardless of how badly you wanted that baby or how long you tried.

It’s okay to not like this part. So let’s let the guilt go, ladies. You can be miserable during the first trimester, and any other part if it fits. You earned it. In fact, you went to hell and back to get here.

We spend so much time, effort, and money chasing that BFP that we sometimes begin to idealize what it will finally be like when we become pregnant. We paint this pretty picture in our minds filled with rainbows in the sky, glitter raining down upon us, our baby bumps growing round while the rest of our body  glows like a magical earth goddesses, while we hold picture perfect yoga poses, and lovingly chuckle at our partners as they struggle to assemble the perfect crib. Oh and we’re craving nothing but veggies and fruit.

Yeah, that’s probably not going to happen.

So when early pregnancy isn’t quite what you imagined it would be during the years you were trying to conceive, please don’t beat yourself up over it. Let the guilt go! You have the right to be heard and to feel what you feel. Guilt free. Yes, you definitely earned it.